[GMAN]

That is a ridiculous fine. I agree that the carrier should not be held responsible. My guess is that they come up with these high amounts and know the driver can't afford to pay. So they hit the carrier. They figure that you will find the cash. With that high of a fine it is obvious that it is a state sponsored scam. If carriers started hitting these governments and name individuals personally, they would change their ways. It needs to be more expensive for them to pursue this type of shake down that anything that they would gain. Before I would pay them a nickel, I would spend the amount of the fine hiring a good lawyer and sue them. Some people don't mind suing others but don't like it when they are on the receiving end. Good luck. Let us know what happens.

[merrick4]

Thanks GMAN, I will keep you all posted. In all fairness though, I mean there were two signs warning the driver not to go down that road and it is based on the weight (the fine) so I don't know maybe the road isn't designed for that type of weight. The problem I have is why am I responsible? Well we know why, like you said they can't get that kind of money out of a person.

I remember once I filed criminal charges along with civil charges against a state agent before. Like I said above they rely on people not fighting back. At this point in my life I'm not out to change the world. If they drop it substantially I will just pay and move on, if not than it's appeal time and I will seek to make it a class action suit and they will pay out the rear. Right now I don't trust a lawyer, I want to speak my own peace and if not than I will hire a lawyer. I was thing of contacting the ATA, they have deep pockets and probably the big carriers would be behind a lawsuit of this order. Again I don't want to battle so I'll try the straight forward approach first. If not I'll drag this out in appeals until I'm out of business and then they get nothing

[GMAN]

One reason some of these states target trucking companies and drivers is due to them thinking that you won't take the time to fight. If more people did fight them on things such as this, perhaps things would begin to change. It needs to cost them dearly for their behavior. It is one thing to fine someone, yet another to make the fines so high that it would break a driver. Of course, in this case, they are going after you, the carrier. It would certainly be worth a telephone call to the ATA to see if they might be of help. Good luck with whatever you decide to do. You can afford to fight something that costs that much. I am with you on this. I don't see how the cops and government could hold the carrier responsible for a driver's behavior when it is out of your control. In this case, it was clearly out of your control.

[wtftrucks.com]

Congratulations, especially moving on in your career so soon after driving school. IMPRESSIVE! Working with company drivers and fleets to finance drivers into their first truck it really is interesting to see the business mentality change. what you never would have cared about before you now take special notice too - where you can save, what you can write off, what you can get back... because it's all about the bottom line. The money is there to be made, making it smart it cutting cost where you can and investing where you'll get growth.

Way to go!

[merrick4]

Originally Posted by wtftrucks.com

where you can save, what you can write off, what you can get back... because it's all about the bottom line. The money is there to be made, making it smart it cutting cost where you can and investing where you'll get growth.
Way to go!

Thank you wtftrucks. You're right, as GMAN has insisted very much over the years, this is a business. I do not use the company as a personal ATM machine. I take a paycheck like everyone else and live off of that. I write off what needs to be written off but even that I'm careful as I don't want any games with the IRS. I play it straight.

I'm nervous a bit now as I could go on vacation but I'm the only one with keys to the mailbox and has access to the banks but I'm having hip surgery in two weeks (been training all my life, finally caught up with me) I'll be local but not able to get around so much as I'll be on crutches and bed ridden for a bit.

I'm sure it will go fine though. So next Friday Wisconsin to fight this ticket and the following surgery. Busy couple of weeks.

[chris1]

So it's Friday,what happened?

[merrick4]

Long day. Boy I miss the pre TSA days ( of course I understand 911 etc), anyway I made it up there smoothly. I think I'm getting old; I use to love to travel. I just don't want to leave South Florida.

I went up with a folder with copies of the pertinent statues and I believe he wrote the ticket for the wrong amount. My whole argument was going to be on section of statue that says for the purpose of Public Safety or something like that the company is at fault. There was another statute that says I am not permitted to allow a driver to travel down weight restricted roads. This is of course impossible just like someone gets busted for DUI and the court takes away their license and fines the heck out of them but what's to stop that person from walking out of the courthouse and sitting in his car and drinking a six pack and going on. That is it's impossible for me to stop a driver from willfully ignoring signs. I did speak with another lawyer who has been doing this for 40 years and he said that's the way it has always been. I asked why would I hire him if he agrees with the law. (he took offense at that)

Anyway, I check into court and am told they got a letter that I plead not guilty. I told them I never sent a letter. I was told to sit down for a moment while they sort this out.

To make a long story short a lawyer shows up to represent me. I'm not sure why but Ryder is taking care of this for me. I didn't even have to go. And what's more this lawyer was sharp. His line of defense was exactly what I was looking for. I think what is going on, several of their customers have gotten massive tickets from the same cop. And actually he was representing one of those customers too that same day.

The court gave me some green paper and they offered to drop it to just under $10,000 and $11,000 (I don't know the original amount for this other customer who is owned by a billion dollar company), and he rejected both offers and is going to take it to trial. I'm not sure if the other company was fined for the same road but I found out that the road my driver was on use to be a truck route.

I assumed that it was for road weight bearing purposes such a steep fine, but the lawyer said a little girl got killed by a truck a while back hence the law. If they are going to restrict trucks from every road someone gets hit we won't be able to travel any road. And basically this one particular cop is writing all these massive tickets.

I heard them schedule pretrial something or other for next week, but he just said don't worry about anything; I don't have to do a thing. So I drove right back to the airport and paid $50 to change my flights and got back about 27 hours after I left.

He's I guess going to try and get it down to a reasonable amount that makes business sense to pay or else he will fight this law all the way up, which is what I wanted in the first place.

So that was that. The weird thing is I live by Ft Lauderdale and we have such a mixture of cultures and accents that people should be use to different accents yet I daily have trouble with my Boston accent and yet up there everyone understood me completely.

Met some interesting people at the airport, I can see now all this traveling you could meet a ton of people and contacts. But I was so happy to get home.

While I was sitting in court I saw some other trucking company with a massive fine but she I think was going to fight it. I am not a trusting person at all and am like a mother hen over most things until I find someone competent and then I will let them do their job. This lawyer I have was sharp, so I will just wait patiently now.

And that was that for now.

[solo379]

Do you have some kind of a written contract with that lawyer? Cause if not, i'd be careful... Good luck to you! Sometimes (more often that we would think) those laws making no sense at all!

[merrick4]

Hi Solo, no contract but I immediately contacted Ryder and they checked with legal and I am indeed being represented. As mentioned one of the other companies that got a ticket is owned by a billion, many billions, dollar company. I don't know why they just didn't get their own lawyer. However they are or were Ryder's biggest customer and I am somewhat guessing maybe they were using a Rental (that is it said Ryder on the door not the company's name) and they wrote the ticket to Ryder and Ryder went to charge it back to the company. I don't know.

But I read the law and leasing companies are exempt from these violations so maybe nobody took the time to read everything. Anyway, the lawyer is saying that one cop is writing all these tickets as I mentioned above so maybe he wants to handle mine so I don't take another avenue and has control of the whole situation. The law firm has been around for a very long time (I looked it all up after). When this is all said and done, I will post more info (the law firm, the name of the trucking company that's owned by billionaires etc. I just want to keep all quiet now).

Thank you and glad to see you're still around.

[GMAN]

It sounds like you may have caught a lucky break, Merrick. Lawyers are usually better equipped to handle this type of thing. And, with Ryder paying his fee, that is also a plus. Hopefully, he will let you know something shortly.